All Questions

First, allow me to setup the relevant information. It is well known that a Morse function $f:M\to\mathbb{R}$ induces a handle decomposition of $M$. For simplicity, let's restrict for now to the ...

Is there an analog of Cerf theory in PL? More specifically, given two handle decompositions of a PL (relative) cobordism $W$, is it always possible to go from one handle decomposition to the other via ...

Let $M$ be a smooth manifold and $K$ a triangulation of $M$, so $K$ is a regular CW-complex and in particular a simplicial complex. Assume that $M$ is compact so $K$ is finite. Let $f\colon K \to \...

Let $X$ denote a regular cell structure on a closed (orientable) $n$-manifold (If it helps, the cells are polytopal and the attaching maps are affine). Recall that a discrete Morse function on this ...

In "vanilla" Morse theory, you can construct cycles representing integral homology classes of a smooth manifold from a Morse function on the manifold (by looking at the flow into/out of the critical ...